The Ceraphronoidea are a small

hymenoptera Hymenoptera is a large order (biology), order of insects, comprising the sawfly, sawflies, wasps, bees, and ants. Over 150,000 living species of Hymenoptera have been described, in addition to over 2,000 extinct ones. Many of the species are Par ...

n superfamily that includes only two families, and a total of some 800 species, though a great many species are still undescribed. It is a poorly known group as a whole, and most are believed to be

parasitoid In evolutionary ecology, a parasitoid is an organism that lives in close association with its host (biology), host at the host's expense, eventually resulting in the death of the host. Parasitoidism is one of six major evolutionarily stable str ...

hyperparasitoid A hyperparasite, also known as a metaparasite, is a parasite whose host, often an insect, is also a parasite, often specifically a parasitoid. Hyperparasites are found mainly among the wasp-waisted Apocrita within the Hymenoptera, and in two ...

s. The two families are unified by several characters, the most visible of which is their wing venation is greatly reduced in a very specific and unique way; the costal and radial veins have fused so no costal cell is present, a short break occurs at the stigma, and the only vein in the wing membrane itself is the radial sector, which is short and curved, arising from the stigma. The taxon was erected by

Alexander Henry Haliday Alexander Henry Haliday (1806–1870, also known as Enrico Alessandro Haliday, Alexis Heinrich Haliday, or simply Haliday) was an Irish entomologist. He is primarily known for his work on Hymenoptera, Diptera, and Thysanoptera, but worked on ...

. Some fossil families that were formerly assigned to this group have since been reassigned elsewhere including

Aptenoperissidae ''Aptenoperissus'' is a genus of extinct wasp with eight described species, placed into the monotypic family Aptenoperissidae. The type species ''Aptenoperissus burmanicus'' resembles a mix between a grasshopper, an ant, and a wasp. It was descr ...

Radiophronidae Radiophronidae is an extinct family of wasps known from two genera found in Cretaceous (Albian) aged amber from Spain. While originally classified in Ceraphronoidea, they were later considered to probably be members of Chrysidoidea The super ...

and Stigmaphronidae.

References

*Dessart, P. & Cancemi, P. 1987. Tableau dichotomique des genres de Ceraphronoidea (Hymenoptera) avec commentaires et nouvelles especies. ''Frustula Entomologica'' 7-8: 307–372. *Johnson, N. F. & L. Musetti. 2004. Catalog of the systematic literature of the superfamily Ceraphronoidea (Hymenoptera). ''Contributions of the American Entomological Institute'' 33 (2): 1–149.

External links

Hymatol

Phylogenetics In biology, phylogenetics (; from Greek language, Greek wikt:φυλή, φυλή/wikt:φῦλον, φῦλον [] "tribe, clan, race", and wikt:γενετικός, γενετικός [] "origin, source, birth") is the study of the evolutionary his ...

Ceraphronoidea, Apocrita superfamilies Taxa named by Alexander Henry Haliday {{Apocrita-stub